TOM WHITEHURST: Michigan madman is the face of Texas?

SAN ANGELO, Texas - A couple of weeks back, when Ted Nugent’s racist misogynistic rant was all the rage, one of the younger national pundits was asked whether Greg Abbott’s close association with the wacky rocker would hurt Abbott politically.

The pundit smirked the same smirk that any Texan who happened to be viewing at the time would have been smirking.

“Well, first off,” he said, “it’s Texas.”

Nuff said?

This is how the world views us nowadays — all of us. We’re a secessionist gun-loving hog-hunting federal government-hating California-baiting stereotype thanks to Gov. Rick Perry, Abbott and Nugent.

Don’t believe me? OK, if I were to say “Alaska,” how many of you would think first of Sarah Palin, probably criticizing President Obama while gutting a moose she just shot with a 7-mag? And how fair is that to Alaskans? (And how many of you just thought, “Yeah, all 14 of them,” or was I the only one?) See how stereotypes work?

And see how they morph? Our stereotype and chief spokesman is now the Motor City Madman. Not Bob Wills, another musician whose career was associated with a Texas politician. And not that laid-back pony-tailed old dope smoker who can’t wait to get back on the road again, the one who wrote that Patsy Cline song.

You’d think, after all that IRS trouble, that there would be at least a little bit of tea party in ol’ Willie, but no. There’s just not enough pure hate in him — no visceral hate for the government that Nugent hates. You know which government I’m talking about — the oppressor that never got around to sending healthy, Vietnam-age Nugent to war while simultaneously making the world safe for him to get rich.

Used to be, lilting, apolitical Western swing defined us. Now, when wild-eyed, over-amplified Nugent speaks, the rest of the world shrugs and says, “It’s Texas.” Is that what we want?

Yes, according to the results of Tuesday’s primary election. It certainly answered the question about how much damage Nugent did to Abbott. Our attorney general, best known for finding excuses to sue the federal government when he’s not hanging out with the Nuge, took 91.5 percent of the primary vote in a four-candidate race. Democrat Wendy Davis managed only 79 percent in a two-candidate race.

Let’s see a show of hands — how many think that Nugent cost Abbott that other 8.5 percent? If anything, Nugent cemented exactly the message Abbott wants to send.

I have to give Abbott credit for being daringly cerebral enough in his campaign commercial to use the big ol’ word “prioritize” — in the context of the economy, no less. But in the same commercial he talked about sending a message to Austin. That ought to save him money on travel since Austin is where he lives and has spent a goodly portion of his adult life.

But Abbott’s message is, on the whole, less misleading than those of many Republican primary candidates, especially the most successful ones. Then there’s Land Commissioner Jerry Patterson, who ran for lieutenant governor. He learned the hard way that honesty is the worst policy for getting elected, finishing fourth out of four.

More was the pity for Republican Agriculture Commissioner candidate J. Allen Carnes. The levelheaded British publication The Economist, in an article about Texas politics headlined “Stupid season,” led with this quote by Carnes: “I’m a very staunch supporter of the Second Amendment, but why talk about it? It has nothing to do with this job, unless you’re talking about hog eradication.”

That refreshing mix of honesty and sanity earned Carnes fifth place out of five. It’s mystifying to me that this could happen in Texas to a guy who, because of his height and the shape of his jaw, looks a little bit like Troy Aikman.

I’m not suggesting that the Democrats are the answer. They voted Kinky Friedman into the runoff for their ag commission nomination.

But there has to be a way for Republicans to be Republican without having to be Ted Nugent fans — fans of the Nugent ideology, not the music. I like the music. My favorite is “Great White Buffalo,” which, if you bother to listen to the lyrics, sounds suspiciously environmentalist. Maybe his head was in a different place back in the mid-1970s.

But, like I was saying, there has to be a way for Texas Republicans to just concentrate on the tax-limiting, road-reconstructing, future-water-supply-securing parts of the message. It would be a true limited-government approach, like they always say they want — unlike gay marriage banning and abortion limiting, which expands government.

Do ag commissioners have to put defense of the Second Amendment ahead of agriculture commissioning? Should anti-abortion credentials determine who gets to be comptroller or railroad commissioner?

Probably I should just shut up now and go back to where I came from — except I’m already there.

Tom Whitehurst Jr. is editorial page editor for the Corpus Christi Caller-Times. Contact him at whitehurstt@caller.com.